Sadly on May 6th 2005, while working at his studio on the animated short Lorenzo, Joe Grant died of a heart attack at the age of 96 just 9 days short of his 97th Birthday.[4]Chicken Little (2005) which was released a year after his death and the last Disney film he worked on was dedicated to him. It was said on the Disney DVD of Lady and the Tramp that Grant owned a dog named Lady who the main character of the movie was based on.

A book about both Joe Grant and the late Joe Ranft who died in a car accident on August 16th, 2005 (just 3 months after Joe Grant's passing) entitled Two Guys Named Joe: Master Animation Storytellers (ISBN 9781423110675) by Animation Historian John Canemaker was published on August 3rd, 2010.[5]